#4: Photo Essay - Family time and Exploring Catalina Island

​I am back in Colorado, and just started my next class at school, probability and statistics (we only take one class at a time, but very intensely). Between last Wednesday and Sunday, I was lucky to have bee in California to see my family. Since last Christmas, with both of our racing, school, and work schedules, I have seen my brother two times – two days in March and two around Independence Day, so when my parents realized that we both had a break from school at the same time, they decided we should meet where my brother goes to school in California. We decide to go to Sanata Catalina Island (henceforth called Catalina), a short ferry ride from LA. Naturally, I brought my new Pivot Les SL, but I also spent time hiking and exploring the activities the area had to offer with my family. I have been to southern California once for races, but never really spent time there, and I never imagined my family would go to a place like Catalina -- we typically are more drawn to place like Vermont. My only knowledge of Catalina was from popular culture. Once you get beyond the bustle of the tourist-spots, the biking, hiking, and ocean activities are incredible, and the terrain is very cool! Here’s a little taste!

Wednesday: exploring Avalon

We spent the first afternoon exploring Avalon on foot. Avalon is the main town on Catalina Island and is a tourist hotspot with many hotels, restaurants, and shops. I went for a run, as I have been doing for the past few weeks as cross-training, and thought I'd feel amazing since this was my first time below 5,000 feet since early July, but all of that altitude training didn't seem to help my running pace! ;)

The main walking street along the water, with many restaurants and shops, and the harbor to the right. During the day, this spot is packed with people.

The small cottages (many of which have one room) are packed in like sardines, and, based on the real estate ads I saw, they are not cheap. People also tend to drive golf carts on the island as there is a 10+ year waiting list to own a car. It is strange walking around in a town surrounded by golf carts in place of cars. Even the majority of parking spots at the grocery store are sized for golf carts.

There is even a golf course on the island (this is the first tee), which probably takes up a quarter of the town's land space, and must be very expensive to maintain given the lack of rain and limited supply of fresh water.

Thursday: Hiking and some good food

We started off the day at Jacks, a Hollywood western movie-themed diner, compete with "maple-flavored syrup", which, being a New Englander, sounded pretty terrible. Most restaurants serve bottled water since all fresh water on the island comes from desalinization, meaning they have limited supplies and it doesn't taste great.

The hike started out up a gorgeous, steep road overlooking the harbor. The round building in the distance is the Catalina Casino, which was built in 1929, but is no longer in operation. It still holds movie screenings, and has the largest circular ballroom in the world.

Despite the fact that Catalina is only 22 miles long and 8 miles wide at its widest point, it is very hilly, with the highest point being over 2,000 feet.

There are about 150 bison on the island. A film company brought 14 in 1924 for a movie shoot, but didn't bring them back to the mainland due to budget shortfalls, so they now are part of the fauna on the island. Luckily, I did not see any during my time there.

After about an hour, the road turned to dirt as we travelled along the Trans-Catalina Trail, and we only saw one other person the rest of the hike. Most of the interior is restricted to permitted vehicles only, and is protected by the Catalina Island Conservancy. The Trans-Catalina Trail traverses the entire length of the island, and most people hike it over a few days.

The views were spectacular, and the terrain was very unique. There were virtually no large trees outside of town, and very little human infrastructure besides dirt roads and trails.

Looking north along the western coast of the island opposite Avalon.

After about 3 1/2 hours hiking, we descended back down into the valley where Avalon is located. This is a monument to William Wrigley Jr. (of Wrigley Gum fame), who bought out shares of island ownership from the previous owner in the early 1900s until he owned virtually all of it. The Chicago Cubs, who are owned by the Wrigleys, used the island as their spring training facility from 1921-1952. The Wrigley's bought all of the Santa Catalina Island company, which owns many of the tourist concessions and land rights, and still own it to this day. Many places on the island are named for members of the Wrigley family, and there is plenty of Wrigley Gum and Cubs memorabilia.

We have small cacti in Colorado Springs, but nothing like this!

We went out to dinner at a Mexican restaurant that evening, and it's safe to say I was stuffed. The food on the island is very good, especially after a long hike! The seafood and Mexican food (especially the salsa) was the highlight.

Friday: a (longer-than-it-should-have-been) bike ride and some ocean activities

After another breakfast at Jack's, I headed out for what was supposed to be a short ride (a little over an hour). I climbed up out of Avalon to well over 1,500 feet above the ocean on a paved road that was lined with large trees. I'm glad I had MTB gearing, since the average grade was 10%.

The road eventually turned to dirt, (more like sand) and there were many offshoots of varying degrees of establishment from wide trails to well-made roads that snaked their way back toward the coast. I took one called Middle Ranch Road that descended down toward the western shore of the island through a long valley. There was one house and barn, and a few campsites, but the rest of the road was surrounded by rolling desert and shrubs.

Dirt road like these are what you dream about!!

My Pivot Les SL with Vittoria Mezcal tires was the perfect bike for this type of riding. I didn't know whether the riding on Catalina was going to be mostly on gravel roads or on loose trails before I arrived, but I knew this bike could handle anything. It's the perfect exploration vehicle. When in doubt, a MTB is always the best option. It's safe to say this was the only Pivot on the island. Most of the bikes were townie e-bikes with throttles.

I arrived at Little Harbor, at approximately the midpoint of the island's length, after about 1 hour of riding. There is a small campsite by the beach that Trans-Catalina Trail hikers use, but other than that and a couple of boats, the beach was empty and the water was very enticing.

Water stop! I climbed up from the ocean to the airport at 1600 feet. By this point, I had gone way over my ride time and was out of water and still had 10 miles to get home, so I stopped to refill at the old "terminal" building, which is now a restaurant. Nicknamed the "Airport in the Sky" for its location at one of Catalina's highest points overlooking the ocean, the Catalina Airport was built by leveling two mountains and filling in the small valley in between. The terminal building and control tower are of a mission revival architecture style on the exterior, and are certainly much prettier than the drab concrete and metal of most small airports. The airport was relatively busy, as some people and mail reach Catalina via charter plane, as opposed to the more typical route via ferry.

The road back toward Avalon traversed along a ridge 1500 feet above the water for the first 7 miles before dropping down into town.

Looking toward LA. The haziness made it feel as though we were in the middle of the ocean, even though we were only about 30 miles from the shore. Interestingly, despite our proximity to one of the largest metropolitan areas in the world, the stars at night were spectacular.

After finishing my ride and grabbing lunch, we headed out for a few ocean activities -- parasailing and taking a tour in a boat with windows underwater to see fish and other marine life. At mid-afternoon, the harbor was packed with boats, many of whom had rented mooring spots for the weekend. Many people visit the island in this way, and the harbor seems to become quite the party spot at night.

The "submarine" (cleverly disguised boat) that took us on the harbor tour.

Day 4: A long ride to Two Harbors

I spent Saturday morning on a ride over four hours that brought me from Avalon past Two Harbors nearly to the northern tip of the island. This was the view looking down into Two Harbors from the south. The town is much smaller than Avalon, and only has dirt roads. It it located on an isthmus, and has harbors on both sides. I was much more conservative with my route planning this time, and it only took me just under 2 hours to reach the town from Avalon, so I had ample time to explore beyond it.

After initially reaching Two Harbors and refilling my bottles, I headed out on the road the traverses the hillside along the coast to the north which stays about 100 feet above the water the entire time. It passed several gorgeous coves and cliffs, and also went through a few summer camps.

The many coves and outcroppings meant the road constantly snaked back and forth. I passed many hikers, but only saw one car.

One of the coves. Not a bad spot to anchor your boat!

After meeting up with my family and taking the ferry boat back to Avalon (the first, and hopefully last time my Pivot has to ride on a boat), we packed up, had a nice dinner, and left early the next morning. The early morning light on the harbor on a quiet Sunday morning (most people don't get up early in resort towns like this) was beautiful.

I hope this gave you a bit of a look at how amazing Catalina Island is! Like so many tourist hotspots, many people travel there for the traditional activities, centered around the shopping and dining in Avalon and the ocean (obviosuly), but once you explore a bit beyond where most other people go, there are so many hidden gems on the interior of the island to be ridden or hiked. In my opinion, exploring on bike or by foot is far more interesting than taking a jeep tour or shopping for shorts that you could get for 1/3 of the price on the mainland.

I hope you enjoyed this, and let me know if you want more photo essays (with better pictures, once my new phone arrives), from races or other events! Thanks for looking and reading!